


Once upon a night at the E.R.

by kriszeth



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2017-08-28
Packaged: 2018-12-21 01:58:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11933937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kriszeth/pseuds/kriszeth
Summary: Meg visits Doctor Castiel at the E.R. Fluff ensues.





	Once upon a night at the E.R.

"You." Castiel sighed, one hand still on the curtain that served as separators on the E. R. for individual assessment.

"Heya, Doc." Meg smirked, swinging her legs back and forth, seated on the hospital bed as if she belonged there.

Castiel gave a perfunctory look to the medical records in his chart, already knowing Meg’s sheet wasn’t there, even when he had explicitly instructed the personnel under his command he was to be summoned immediately when Meg arrived if there wasn’t an emergency. Which, unusually, there hadn’t been any today.

He frowned, taking a good look at the young woman. Her clothes were too light for being outside -to improve movement if she ever was on a tight spot, he guessed-, but still not enough for the current weather -It was already snowing for God’s sake-, but Meg didn’t look seriously harmed.

Meg winced when the nurse -April, Castiel noticed-, pulled off none too gently on the old dressings she sported on both wrists.

"I’ll take it from here." He told the assistant nurse, the order implied on the tone of his voice.

April didn’t look too happy about it but complied, showing her displeasure on the tight line of her mouth as she took off her nitrile gloves with jerky movements and sent a glare Meg’s way before departing.

The E. R. personnel didn’t like Meg very much, not that Meg cared a lot about it. Castiel did though, and the way they treated the young woman was something he had taken up way too many times with his staff, especially the women under his command.

It changed nothing.

Castiel didn’t understand why Meg was so hated. She knew when to be quiet and when confrontation was needed. She had a good head on her shoulders, analytical, cool, collected, fast thinking. Meg was a natural at problem solving, which were all good qualities to have in Castiel’s line of work. Her sassy attitude was not well received, though.

Like right that instant for example, when Meg bided the nurse goodbye with her middle finger as April’s back disappeared behind the curtain. Well, maybe Meg had had a hand into his staff not liking her.

Castiel took the time to properly close the thin material, left open on purpose, to give himself and his patient some privacy, knowing it’d make his coworkers mad. If they wanted to act like children, Castiel didn’t have any problems retaliating. If that made him childish too, well, nothing to do about it.

Meg raised an eyebrow, which he studiously ignored in favor of taking the vacated stool in front of her, squinting at her wrists.

"These wounds have festered."

Castiel didn’t know how Meg got the abrasions, but he was suddenly angry at whomever put them there in the first place. A rough officer with no respect for people? One of the scattered criminals she kept running into and _from_ …?

A lover?

Castiel would ask, but he knew he wouldn’t get a straight answer.

"Hard to come by clean bandages without a five fingers discount, Doc." Meg replied saucily, lips pulled into her default smirk.

_Did she have a sassy answer for everything?_ Castiel sighed deeply, knowing that today he would break his record in so doing and proceeded to clean and disinfect.

Meg looked tired. Way too pale to be healthy, with dark bags under her eyes that not even her smudged eye-shadow concealed.

_Smoky eyes_ , Meg called them.

_Raccoon eyes_ , he dubbed.

Castiel left his mind wander, remembering how he had met Meg at the crack of dawn one winter morning, quite like today actually, after finishing a forty-eight long hour shift at the E. R. He had been reversing his car in the parking lot when a stumbling figure walked into his bumper.

Meg had been bleeding, not from the impact, but from a bullet in her stomach, disoriented from blood loss and being out for far too long in the cold. Some light anemia and a fever that ran for hours after surgical intervention.

Meg had still had the strength to curse him to Hell and back for being a boor though.

Suffice it to say, that moment was the beginning of quite the unusual relationship. And Castiel had gotten lost in his own thoughts again, hadn’t he? Not even noticing when he finished cleaning the wounds.

Meg’s crooked eyebrow and fond smirk greeted him into the real world. How long had he been quiet? And how much time had they spent together that the _Little Demon_ -as Dean called her-, had learned not to probe him to talk?

"You could have gone to Sam." Castiel picked up their conversation, applying ointment to help the healing process.

"Jess just popped out her baby. They don’t need a burden." Meg shrugged.

"You are not a burden." He protested, staring up into her eyes in silent disapproval.

Castiel knew how effective it was when he stared at people with a stony expression and he didn’t have any qualms against abusing it either. Not disappointed, Meg fidgeted unnerved, hating his calm authority. It made her feel like the child she never got to be, instead of the twenty year old woman she already was.

It was difficult to feel undeserving when the Doctor looked at you with such intensity. _His laser stare_ , Sam called it. It was also easier for all parties involved to go along with whatever he said. Not that Meg would. At least not out-loud.

"What about Dean?" Castiel asked when the silence lingered, reaching for new bandages.

"What about Dean?" Meg deflected. She was very good at pretending and denying, but she didn’t hold a candle to Castiel’s intensity.

Meg knew it was in her best interest to just answer the question, especially if she wanted him to keep soothing the pain and numbness in her wrists with those small circles his fingers burned into her skin.

"Dean’s an asshole." She relented with a pout.

"You fought again." Castiel surmised.

 It was not a surprise, really. Dean and Meg were so alike they butted heads constantly; keeping grudges until a third party intervened. In such circumstances, Meg would stay at Sam and Jess’s place, giving time for Dean to cool off. With Sam’s new baby into the equation now, it was no brainer Meg was reticent to disturb the couple. Maybe the younger brother was more understanding of her plight, but Meg didn’t want to overstay her welcome, especially when she knew the lack of sleep and nervous breakdowns new parents constantly had.

Also, Angry Sam? Not a sight Meg wanted to face. Ever again. The guy was scary as Hell and Meg knew scary. Hell, she defied scary in a daily basis, but Angry Sam still made her piss her panties in fright, and Meg was trying _really hard_ not to burn any of her newly formed bridges unless she was in a really, _really_ tight spot -since she was unlucky enough to find herself in a lot of them-. So Meg had taken to the streets again, staying here and there and avoiding her old hangouts.

"And it’s also Christmas…" Castiel mumbled to himself, ignorant of her silent musings. Not that he cared a lot about Christmas. He was dreading having to go to the family dinner later in the evening and was quite relieved Meg had made an appearance.

"Says the Doc so married to his job he even works holidays." Meg teased.

Castiel shrugged. “Actually, my shift’s almost over.”

Meg seemed to deflate at that, shoulders slumping and smirk turning into a disappointed frown. Castiel stared. Her lips were certainly alluring.

"Oh," she fidgeted again when Castiel kept on staring, this time without any ulterior motive, but by habit. "I was kinda hoping I could crash here until the sun comes up, you know. It’s kinda chilly outside."

In wasn’t the first time Meg stayed to accompany him on his shift, but it was the first time she asked for permission to do it. It was, of course, against protocol to keep people into the E. R. when they didn’t need medical assistance, cluttering the space with unauthorized acquaintances that distracted you from work was prohibited, but Meg had a certain calming effect on his patients, if not with his staff, and was often times a soothing presence to those in hysterics, screaming from pain and bleeding and most often dying.

Opposed to Castiel, Meg always knew when to speak up to distract or comfort the wounded, which made his work easier when she was around, so his superiors averted their eyes when she visited.

Castiel was surprised, to say the least, at her sudden display of insecurity. It was at odds with the tough image Meg put on every day to avoid getting picked on.  

It looked endearing on her, but it was also startling.

This time Castiel paid her more attention, eyes squinting studiously on her form, only to find her thinner that the last time he had seen her. That should have been his first clue: Loss of corporal mass.

Although clean and tidy, she looked quite tired, hair falling a little flat with none of her natural waves present. That should have been his second and third clue.

Her clothes looked a little rumpled, as though she’d been sleeping with them on and there were goosebumps forming over her skin, even inside the ward.

It brought up the question about _when exactly_ her fight with Dean had been. Had neither brother even noticed her absence or enquired about her whereabouts?

A sudden rage burned deep inside his chest at the Winchesters, especially since he hadn’t been informed about Meg’s disappearance. Of course, it was not the first time Meg had escaped their radar, but by the looks of it, this time had been for far too long,

Meg’s safety depended on the FBI agents keeping her close and monitored. Her survival, though, depended on her mastery at deceiving people and lying low until the fire burned into ashes, and Meg had grown up relying in no one but herself.

As fast as his anger fired up, it consumed itself to logic and the knowledge about his friends’ exact behavioral response. Still, Castiel really ought to have a strong word with the Winchesters about the situation….

Unless both brothers thought Meg had been staying with the other one, while keeping them updated with false information of the where, the when and with whom she spent her days.

It certainly impeded Castiel from being too angry at the detectives if that were the case. It stood to reason both men were pretty preoccupied with their own lives, with the recent  birth of Sam’s daughter and Dean’s ongoing trial to gain little Emma’s custody, while worrying about Ellen Harvelle’s reaction once he announced his intention to marry Jo.

"Do you even have a place to stay?" he asked deadpan, masking the struggle inside him.

"I’ll find a place." Meg shrugged, oversimplifying her situation as her smirk got back into place. Castiel hated when she did that. "You don’t have to worry about me."

Of course Meg would tell him not to worry after dropping that bomb. The worst thing was that Meg was being genuine when she said it, as if Castiel could help worrying about her. It certainly was one of the other things that Meg did that Castiel hated with a passion.

Maybe he’ll come to regret the decision his mind supplied, but for now the Doctor didn’t care.

"What’s with that?" Meg asked with a frown as he dangled his keys at her eye level.

"Car keys," he whispered so only Meg heard -for there were ears everywhere-, doing a jingling motion to encourage her to take them. "My shift is over in half an hour, I just need to fill up a couple evolution sheets and I’m done. You can stay at my place…"

Meg’s eyes lit up as she reached out for the keys, when something occurred to Castiel, who kept them away just as her fingertips touched the cold metal. “… if you promise to call the Winchesters.”

Her smile turned into a pucker. Meg crossed her arms, sniffing at him in defiance with a calculating frown. Castiel waited patiently for her to make up her mind.

"Ugh! Ok." She grumbled, jumping off the bed and snatching his keys, projecting her displeasure on the poor curtain as April had done just minutes ago.

"Don’t let anyone see you." Castiel reminded her, but she waved him off as if he was an annoying fly buzzing around her.

Not that far a comparison to what he sometimes thought of his own behavior towards her, but they had to be cautious since Meg had been charged with solicitation before.

_Crowley’s idea of a last laugh_ , Meg had confided in him in a bitter tone. _Not that it was true at all, but the damage’s already done_.

Also, they had to take into account she was still a minor in the eyes of the law and Castiel was a grown respectable man that _should know better_ , but didn’t. So Meg had taken to shadow him at work where everyone could see how platonic their relationship was, a chaperone always hovering at each of their meetings. Castiel didn’t mind of course. She looked just like any other premed student on practice at the E.R., curious about the proceedings, with logical questions that made Castiel pull out his books every now and then to try and explain to her certain concepts.

Meg had a good head on her shoulders and followed simple instructions exactly when in need.

Castiel fancied that if she ever decided to continue her education, Meg could be a great nurse or a paramedic or even a doctor if she put her will to it.

With thoughts of her by his side, working shoulder to shoulder, time passed quickly.

*~*~*

Once outside, Meg bee-lined towards the pimpmobile Castiel resisted on giving up, even though he had the money to buy a newer and better car. Meg hated that car with a passion -it was even worse that Dean’s Impala-, but it beat freezing her ass off out on the snowed-in streets and shelters at full capacity all over the city.

Meg hated Christmas.

Meg darted into the backseat, for once glad at the extra space as she rubbed her hands together to warm them over. She couldn’t wait to have her own place and her own car and never have to be monitored every minute of the day ever again by Big Brother.

_Only seven months to go_.

Meg didn’t really have a problem with the Winchesters. They were OK guys, but sometimes their self-righteous piss-contests grated on her nerves. Meg had survived Hell relying on no one but herself only, and she came up on top every time. Now suddenly, Meg had people peering over her shoulder with judgmental eyes at every little thing she did, and that drove her off the reservation like nothing else.

Meg didn’t need to be coddled within an inch of her life, only to cater to the Winchesters’ over-protectiveness. She could protect herself, thank you very much. Maybe that was why Castiel’s calm authority and kindness called to her in a profound level.

Meg knew the only reason the Winchesters had taken guardianship of her, a ward of the state, was obviously because they wanted to bring Crowley down and Meg was a key witness, but it also played a big part that Castiel was fond of her. Jess had tried to explain to her once the legal inner workings of it all, since she was too old to go back into the system, but not important enough to be granted witness protection, especially since Crowley had already been captured and thrown into jail.

That’s when the Winchesters had stood up and taken her under their wing, offering her shelter and a deal to cover her until Crowley’s trial was over or she became legally an adult. Sort of a family, they had said, not that Meg completely trusted it. To Meg, family meant people leaving you behind to fend for yourself.

It was one of the multiple reasons the three of them stomped all over each other’s toes and pulled each other’s tails in a daily basis when forced to share space, especially with Dean.

Of all the men in her life that pulled the proverbial rug under her feet though, Castiel was the one she owed everything to. The first time Meg had met Castiel, the Doctor had almost run her over with the monstrosity he called his car.

The first time Meg actually remembered meeting him for real was on a small hospital room when she woke up from feverish nightmares about her being kidnapped and tortured by Crowley after Castiel had almost run her over.

Castiel had been snoozing on a chair by the side of her bed, keeping vigil while a Federal Agent had kept guard outside the door. To this day, Meg didn’t know why he had stayed behind, even after his shift had ended, for a total stranger that, for all he knew, deserved to be made into target practice, but Meg was tremendously grateful to him since it meant she hadn’t ended up as a rotten corpse on a cold morgue somewhere.

The Doctor had not only saved her life at the crack of that dawn, pulling a bullet out of her guts, but he had given her a chance at life to begin anew. No more running while trying to lay low, always paranoid, looking fearfully over her shoulder for Crowley’s hit-men for rebelling the job he wanted of her.

(Crowley had wanted to whore her out in exchange for drugs and she was neither a red woman nor a junkie to accept that proposal, which pissed off one of the most wanted pimps on the city. Lo and behold, Crowley had become the pain on Meg’s ass that she’d just love to stab on the face).

The nuances of that meeting and the words exchanged escaped her now, thanks to the medication being pumped into her veins at the time, but Meg will forever remember the words Castiel had defended her with to _his friends and coworkers_ and that now were tattooed over her bullet wound: _God created salvation for sinners._

That had pretty much broken Meg’s resolve not to be a snitch and keep running, before she was interviewed by Moose and Squirrel.

So really, Meg couldn’t wait to turn twenty-one and be free of any and all Court related responsibilities. Maybe even get some financial aid from the Government to begin living on her own, find an OK job to pay the bills. All the apple pie life, Slums Edition.

Legally speaking, the only thing worth mentioning was that Meg wasn’t rotting in jail, that she had gotten away from the Crowley mess with only a smack on the hand for being naughty and a permanent notice on her criminal record.

Faced with freedom was quite scary, though, and on some level, a deeply buried part of her she tried not to dig out, Meg didn’t really want it to begin with. She was a follower after all, giving herself over to the cause to bring order into her otherwise hellish life.

Castiel understood that too and hinted in that low gruff of his — which resembled more a sleepy growl than a voice, commanding her attention—, that maybe it was time for her to make Meg Masters her own cause.

Of course, Meg didn’t know how to do that, but maybe she could find out, with Castiel as her counsel, from a certain distance, to give her a choice in the matter without feeling crowded -which was the mistake the Winchester kept making-.

Another shudder passed through Meg as she rummaged inside her bag for a sweater, finding nothing that wasn’t dirty and/or humid. She settled for the trench coat Castiel forgot in the backseat, using it as a blanket while she waited.

It smelled like him, a little soap, a little aftershave and a little hospital cleaner.

Lulled by the quiet on the car and her own introspection, Meg fell asleep and the next thing she knew a shivering Castiel was rapping on the window to be let in. The Doctor had forgone changing clothes, so he still wore the white robe over his dark blue scrubs. It made him look like an overgrown child in pajamas after a nap with all that bed hair he called a hairstyle.

With a sleepy moan, Meg opened the lock and got up, jumping over to the front to ride shotgun while simultaneously trying to make herself smaller, so no one on the parking lot noticed her.

"It’s cold." Castiel darted inside, turning on the ignition and releasing warm air from the car vents. "Why didn’t you turn the heat on?"

"Because I didn’t think this thing had one?" Meg grumbled, voice lower than usual from grogginess. She needed to sleep stat. "Also, you told me not to get caught."

Castiel rolled her eyes. Meg decided to place her arms inside his coat’s sleeves and wear it properly. On her it looked humongous, but it was quite warmth so Meg finally understood why the Doc favored it. Castiel smirked as he pulled off the parking lot to head home.

Meg spent the ride in a sleepy daze, not even noticing she was inside the Doctor’s apartment until Castiel helped her out of his own trench coat. It was getting warmer inside, so he probably had turned on the heating in here too, directing her by the shoulders towards the pit in the middle of the living room, where a semicircular sofa rested on a lower floor level that the rest of the flat. It always made Meg trip as she went down the three steps it took her to reach the ground.

"I’ll make us some hot chocolate." He announced and disappeared into the kitchen.

Meg wrapped herself into the knitted quilt she knew Castiel kept on the couch for those early mornings when sleep won over comfort after pulling crazy shifts in the E. R. With eyes half open, she took off her boots, and crossed her legs to pull her feet under the cozy warmth of the quilt. Meg loved this monstrosity of colorful thread-knots and she wondered if Castiel would get really mad if she took it once Dumb or Dumber came to collect her, as it was wont to happen, once she called them to tell them exactly where she was and where she had been for the last couple months.

That was a conversation Meg was not looking forward to.

She channel surfed until stumbling on one of her favorite Christmas movies of all time: It’s A Wonderful Life.

Christmas.

Wasn’t Castiel supposed to be home for dinner with the bazillion of relatives he had? Meg would feel guilty for crashing his Holiday plans if she didn’t already know the tenuous relationship the Doctor had with the self-righteous pricks on his family. And Meg had thought she had daddy issues.

Meg huffed. "How long does it take to make hot chocolate anyway?"

*~*~*

In the kitchen, Castiel kept wincing for his poor eardrums as he sat on the counter, stirring one handed the chocolate milk at his side over the stove.

"I’m truly sorry." He repeated for the tenth time since the call was picked up. "You know that if I could ask someone to take over this shift and go to dinner with you all, I would."

Which was total bull shit, but it never hurt to suck up while making fake excuses.

"No, you wouldn’t." His stepmother accused.

"No, I wouldn’t." He accepted after a moment of consideration.

There was static on the earpiece as Naomi sighed, resigned. After his father died last summer, Naomi tried to keep all the family together as if nothing had changed. Only that it had. Chuck was dead, for God’s sake, and no amount of good intentions was going to bring him back. A family reunion like the one scheduled for today was only going to bring up all the legal matters that hadn’t been settled yet, thanks to the greed of certain relatives of his.

If possible, Castiel wanted to avoid that mess at all costs, so the appearance of Meg was a blessing disguised in trouble.

"I’ll send your presents by courier." Naomi finally relented, suddenly sounding tired and ancient and defeated.

It made Castiel feel a little sorry for her. But not sorry enough to make an appearance at dinner and he was not going to bring Meg for dinner. Not after what had happened at Father’s funeral.

"I’ll do the same," he promised. "Merry Christmas, Naomi."

"Merry Christmas, Castiel. Take care and please don’t overwork yourself. We don’t need you to pull a Chuck Shurley so soon after your father."

Castiel smiled without humor, indulging in his step-mother’s nostalgia as both nodded, forgetting the other one could not see it, and cut the line in synch. Just in time too, since the hot chocolate was already rising in all its foamy glory.

His mouth watered at the aroma as he served the liquid on a pair of matching mugs, one depicting blue angel wings with a halo while the other showed two horns and a coiled red tail. A present from Dean.

When Castiel went back into the living room, he found Meg curled under his quilt watching TV in sleepy blinks. She looked cute. So far from her rebel persona that Castiel needed to stand there a moment and drink her in.

God, she was beautiful. Meg was a Goddess of alabaster skin, with long ebony locks of usually wavy hair framing a lovely face, big and expressive eyes the color of whiskey and a thin nose with a little turn-up at the tip. Compared to him, she was tiny and lithe enough that Castiel felt he could hug all of her with just one arm.

Meg was also everything his family ingrained into him a woman should not be. Crass in her demeanor, when she should be demure. Loud instead of soft-spoken. Petulant and fierce and opinionated, when she should follow instructions and learn her place. All of Meg was purposely crafted to leave on you the impression she wanted to flaunt. Even the way she dressed with skinny jeans full of holes -from falling and being well worn instead of a fashion statement-, with her vaporous thin blouses and colorful leather jackets with matching black combat boots, and the cheap charms adorning her neck and wrists.

So different from the designer clothes and expensive jewelry Castiel grew up seeing women wear.

Meg was a warrior through and through. Not by choice, but by circumstance, and even if sometimes Castiel mourned all the chances Meg never got in life, he rather admired her for the person she became in spite of it all.

Castiel loved that Meg was a survivor. Survival looked good on her, and maybe there were marks carved deep inside, forever imprinted in her psyche, but Castiel loved how she looked through that dark nightmarish veil in defiance and gave the world a hell of an attitude, the way Meg wore proudly and gracefully her scars as she walked over glass and fire and even death, and still her lips pulled into an insolent smirk. Loved that even after she had lived and died and been reborn, after having her heart ripped out and losing everything, Meg had stood up for herself. _That,_ more than anything, was what made her trustworthy, because knowing what she had been through; Meg had survived to tell the tale.

Castiel couldn’t wait for her to turn twenty-one already.

_God, does that make me a pervert?_

"I can hear you thinking all the way over here, so why don’t you just bring me my hot chocolate before it gets cold?" Meg prompted, not looking away from the TV.

Castiel hurried over to her, feeling himself blush. Meg deserved nothing but his utmost respect, and here he was, wondering when it was prudent to think of her as a sexually desirable woman. It was because Castiel respected her that he had decided to wait until she was legally an adult to court her, not because she wasn’t capable of making an informed consenting choice an adult. Not because of societal mores, but because he wanted to give Meg time to stand on her own feet without feeling indebted to him. Castiel didn’t want a relationship based on who owed who what.

 ”Um, here.” He almost growled, voice rough in embarrassment.

Meg cupped her quilted hands for him to place the mug on, carefully bringing it to her lips to blow off some steam and take small sips. Castiel gulped through a dry throat, hovering.

"I can’t watch TV through your stomach." Meg looked up at him with a displeased frown.

"What?"

"Sit." She ordered, pointing with her chin exactly where she wanted him to sit: beside her.

Castiel acquiesced, minding that the chocolate on his mug didn’t spill. Suddenly self conscious, he was hyper aware of every place their bodies casually touched as she snuggled under his right arm, purring like a cat cuddling into her favorite place.

Castiel was reminded how hot his chocolate was when he burned his tongue as he took a big gulp. Meg laughed quietly at him, looking deviously under her long lashes at his red face before humming, “You´re an angel Clarence.”

Castiel had to cough and clear twice his throat to be able to talk again. “What did you call me?”

"Clarence. Like the angel." She pointed at the LED screen with a tilt of her head and he squinted at the appliance in contemplation.

Castiel had never watched this movie before.

“I’m no angel.”

"You’re _my_ angel." Meg retorted.

Castiel crinkled his eyes affronted, and having no come back of his own he kept squinting at the screen, as if trying to unravel the secrets of the universe in the rerun of a Christmas movie. Using his distraction on the TV to burrow closer, Meg leaned her head on his shoulder as Castiel pulled off an arm reach without even thinking.

The dork.

"Merry Christmas, Clarence."

Castiel looked down at her fondly as she looked up, one side of his mouth pulling up that she answered with a smile before turning back to her movie.

"Merry Christmas, Meg." He kissed her on the temple, just the way she liked.

Outside, the light of day finally broke through dreary clouds.

 


End file.
